


The Potter Chronicles: Book 1

by minaviolet



Series: Incomplete Works [2]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alternate Universe - Gender Changes, Multi
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-12-31
Updated: 2014-12-31
Packaged: 2018-03-04 11:34:57
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 12,196
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3066392
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/minaviolet/pseuds/minaviolet
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Heather and Hadrian Potter are a pair of twins who've known nothing but a life of servitude to the Dursley family, their only living relatives who despise them. But all that's about to change with a letter...<br/>UP FOR ADOPTION, NO PERMISSION NEEDED. PLEASE INFORM ME IF YOU DO, THOUGH.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter I: The Ones-Who-Lived

**Author's Note:**

> I doubt I'll finish this.

CHAPTER ONE

THE ONES WHO LIVED

Mr. Vernon and Mrs. Petunia Dursley, of Number Four, Privet Drive were the last people you'd expect to be involved in anything strange or mysterious, because they just didn't hold with such nonsense.

Mr. Dursley was the director of a firm called Grunnings, which made drills. He was a big, beefy man with hardly any neck, although he did have a very large mustache. Mrs. Dursley was thin and blonde and had nearly twice the usual amount of neck, which came in very useful as she spent so much of her time craning over garden fences, spying on the neighbors. The Dursleys had a small son called Dudley; in their opinion, there was no finer boy anywhere else.

The Dursleys had everything they wanted, but they also had a secret, and their greatest fear was that somebody would discover it. They didn't think they could bear it if anyone found out about the Potters.  Mrs. Potter was Mrs. Dursley's sister, but they hadn't met for several years; in fact, Mrs. Dursley pretended she didn't have a sister, because her sister and her good-for-nothing husband were as abnormal as could be.

The Dursleys shuddered to think what the neighbors would say if the Potters arrived in the street. The Dursleys knew that the Potters had twins; a daughter and a son, but they had never seen them. The twins were another good reason for keeping the Potters away; they didn't want Dudley mixing with children like that.

One day, when Mr. and Mrs. Dursley woke up on a dull, gray Tuesday,  there was nothing about the cloudy sky outside to suggest that strange and mysterious things would soon be happening all over the country. Mr. Dursley hummed as he picked out his most boring tie for work, and Mrs. Dursley gossiped away happily as she wrestled a screaming Dudley into his high chair.

None of them noticed a large, tawny owl flutter past the window.

At half past eight, Mr. Dursley picked up his briefcase, pecked Mrs. Dursley on the cheek, and tried to kiss Dudley good-bye but missed, because Dudley was now having a tantrum and throwing his cereal at the walls. "Little tyke," chortled Mr. Dursley as he left the house. He got into his car and backed out of Number Four's drive.

It was on the corner of the street that he noticed the first sign of something peculiar—a cat reading a map. For a second, Mr. Dursley didn't realize what he had seen—then he jerked his head around to look again. There was a tabby cat standing on the corner of Privet Drive, but there wasn't a map in sight. What could he have been thinking of? It must have been a trick of the light. Mr. Dursley blinked and stared at the cat.

It stared back.

As Mr. Dursley drove around the corner and up the road, he watched the cat in his mirror. It was now reading the sign that said Privet Drive—no, looking at the sign; cats couldn't read maps or signs. Mr. Dursley gave himself a little shake and put the cat out of his mind.

As he drove toward town he thought of nothing except a large order of drills he was hoping to get that day. But on the edge of town, drills were driven out of his mind by something else. As he sat in the usual morning traffic jam, he couldn't help noticing that there seemed to be a lot of strangely dressed people about. People in cloaks. Mr. Dursley couldn't bear people who dressed in funny clothes—the getups you saw on young people!

He supposed this was some stupid new fashion. He drummed his fingers on the steering wheel and his eyes fell on a huddle of these weirdoes standing quite close by. They were whispering excitedly together. Mr. Dursley was enraged to see that a couple of them weren't young at all; why, that man had to be older than he was, and wearing an emerald-green cloak!

The nerve of him! But then it struck Mr. Dursley that this was probably some silly stunt—these people were obviously collecting for something. The traffic moved on and a few minutes later, Mr. Dursley arrived in the Grunnings parking lot, his mind back on drills.

Mr. Dursley always sat with his back to the window in his office on the ninth floor. If he hadn't, he might have found it harder to concentrate on drills that morning.

He didn't see the owls swooping past in broad daylight, though people down in the street did; they pointed and gazed open-mouthed as owl after owl sped overhead. Most of them had never seen an owl even at nighttime.

Mr. Dursley, however, had a perfectly normal, owl-free morning. He yelled at five different people. He made several important telephone calls and shouted a bit more. He was in a very good mood until lunchtime, when he thought he'd stretch his legs and walk across the road to buy himself a bun from the bakery.

He'd forgotten all about the people in cloaks until he passed a group of them next to the baker's.

He eyed them angrily as he passed. He didn't know why, but they made him uneasy.

This bunch were whispering excitedly, too, and he couldn't see a single collecting tin. It was on his way back past them, clutching a large doughnut in a bag, that he caught a few words of what they were saying.

"The Potters, that's right, that's what I heard—yes, their twins, Heather and Hadrian."

Mr. Dursley stopped dead. Fear flooded him. He looked back at the whisperers as if he wanted to say something to them, but thought better of it.

He dashed back across the road, hurried up to his office, snapped at his secretary not to disturb him, seized his telephone, and had almost finished dialing his home number when he changed his mind. He put the receiver back down and stroked his mustache, thinking...no, he was being stupid. Potter wasn't such an unusual name. It wasn’t impossible for there to be multiple people with twins named Heather and Hadrian.

Come to think of it, he wasn't even sure the twins were called Heather and Hadrian. He'd never even seen them. It might have been Harriet and Henry. Or Hazel and Harry. There was no point in worrying Petunia; she always got so upset at any mention of her sister. He didn't blame her—if he'd had a sister like that—but all the same, those people in cloaks...

He found it a lot harder to concentrate on drills that afternoon and when he left the building at five o'clock, he was still so worried that he walked straight into someone just outside the door.

"Sorry," he grunted, as the tiny old man stumbled and almost fell. It was a few seconds before Mr. Dursley realized that the man was wearing a violet cloak. He didn't seem at all upset at being almost knocked to the ground. On the contrary, his face split into a wide smile and he said in a squeaky voice that made passersby stare, "Don't be sorry, my dear sir, for nothing could upset me today! Rejoice, for You-Know-Who has gone at last! Even Muggles like yourself should be celebrating, this happy, happy day!"

And the old man hugged Mr. Dursley around the middle and walked off. Mr. Dursley stood rooted to the spot. He had been hugged by a complete stranger. He also thought he had been called a Muggle, whatever that was. He was rattled. He hurried to his car and set off for home, hoping he was imagining things, which he had never hoped before, because he didn't approve of imagination.

As he pulled into the driveway of Number Four, the first thing he saw–and it didn't improve his mood—was the tabby cat he'd spotted that morning. It was now sitting on his garden wall. He was sure it was the same one; it had the same markings around its eyes.

"Shoo!" said Mr. Dursley loudly. The cat didn't move. It just gave him a stern look. Was this normal cat behavior? Mr. Dursley wondered. Trying to pull himself together, he let himself into the house. He was still determined not to mention anything to his wife.

Mrs. Dursley had had a nice, normal day. She told him over dinner all about Mrs. Next Door's problems with her daughter and how Dudley had learned a new word ("Won't!"). Mr. Dursley tried to act normally. When Dudley had been put to bed, he went into the living room in time to catch the last report on the evening news:

"And finally, bird-watchers everywhere have reported that the nation's owls have been behaving very unusually today. Although owls normally hunt at night and are hardly ever seen in daylight, there have been hundreds of sightings of these birds flying in every direction since sunrise. Experts are unable to explain why the owls have suddenly changed their sleeping pattern." The newscaster allowed himself a grin.

"Most mysterious. And now, over to Jim McGuffin with the weather. Going to be any more showers of owls tonight, Jim?"

"Well, Ted," said the weatherman, "I don't know about that, but it's not only the owls that have been acting oddly today. Viewers as far apart as Kent, Yorkshire, and Dundee have been phoning in to tell me that instead of the rain I promised yesterday, they've had a downpour of shooting stars! Perhaps people have been celebrating Bonfire Night early—it's not until next week, folks! But I can promise a wet night tonight."

Mr. Dursley sat frozen in his armchair. Shooting stars all over Britain? Owls flying by daylight? Mysterious people in cloaks all over the place?

And a whisper, a whisper about the Potters...

Mrs. Dursley came into the living room carrying two cups of tea. It was no good. He'd have to say something to her. He cleared his throat nervously. "Er—Petunia, dear—you haven't heard from your sister lately, have you?"

As he had expected, Mrs. Dursley looked shocked and angry. After all, they normally pretended she didn't have a sister.

"No," she said sharply. "Why?"

"Funny stuff on the news," Mr. Dursley mumbled. "Owls...shooting stars...and there were a lot of funny-looking people in town today..."

"So?" snapped Mrs. Dursley.

"Well, I just thought...maybe...it was something to do with...you know...her crowd."

Mrs. Dursley sipped her tea through pursed lips. Mr. Dursley wondered whether he dared tell her he'd heard the name "Potter." He decided he didn't dare. Instead he said, as casually as he could, "Their twins—they'd be about Dudley's age now, wouldn't they?"

"I suppose so," said Mrs. Dursley stiffly.

"What were their names again? Harriet and Heath, weren't they?"

"Heather and Hadrian. Nasty, strange names, if you ask me."

"Oh, yes," said Mr. Dursley, his heart sinking horribly. "Yes, I quite agree."

He didn't say another word on the subject as they went upstairs to bed.

While Mrs. Dursley was in the bathroom, Mr. Dursley crept to the bedroom window and peered down into the front garden. The cat was still there.

It was staring down Privet Drive as though it were waiting for something.

Was he imagining things? Could all this have anything to do with the Potters? If it did...if it got out that they were related to a pair of—well, he didn't think he could bear it.

The Dursleys got into bed. Mrs. Dursley fell asleep quickly but Mr. Dursley lay awake, turning it all over in his mind. His last, comforting thought before he fell asleep was that even if the Potters were involved, there was no reason for them to come near him and Mrs. Dursley. The Potters knew very well what he and Petunia thought about them and their kind...

He couldn't see how he and Petunia could get mixed up in anything that might be going on—he yawned and turned over—it couldn't affect them...

How very wrong he was.

Mr. Dursley might have been drifting into an uneasy sleep, but the cat on the wall outside was showing no sign of sleepiness. It was sitting as still as a statue, its eyes fixed unblinkingly on the far corner of Privet Drive. It didn't so much as quiver when a car door slammed on the next street, nor when two owls swooped overhead. In fact, it was nearly midnight before the cat moved at all.

A woman appeared on the corner the cat had been watching, appeared so suddenly and silently you'd have thought she'd just popped out of the ground. The cat's tail twitched and its eyes narrowed.

Nothing like this woman had ever been seen on Privet Drive. She was tall, thin, and very old, judging by the silver of her hair, which was long enough to tuck into her belt. She was wearing long robes, a purple cloak that swept the ground, and high-heeled, buckled boots.

Her blue eyes were light, bright blue, and sparkling behind half-moon spectacles and her nose was very long and crooked, as though it had been broken at least twice. This woman's name was Alba Dumbledore.

Alba Dumbledore didn't seem to realize that she had just arrived in a street where everything from her name to her boots was unwelcome. She was busy rummaging in her cloak, looking for something. But she did seem to realize she was being watched, because she looked up suddenly at the cat, which was still staring at her from the other end of the street. For some reason, the sight of the cat seemed to amuse her. She chuckled and murmured, "I should have known."

She found what she was looking for in her inside pocket. It seemed to be a silver cigarette lighter. She flicked it open, held it up in the air, and clicked it. The nearest street lamp went out with a little pop. She clicked it again—the next lamp flickered into darkness.

Twelve times she clicked the Put-Outer, until the only lights left on the whole street were two tiny pinpricks in the distance, which were the eyes of the cat watching her. If anyone looked out of their window now, even beady-eyed Mrs. Dursley, they wouldn't be able to see anything that was happening down on the pavement.

Dumbledore slipped the Put-Outer back inside her cloak and set off down the street toward Number Four, where she sat down on the wall next to the cat. She didn't look at it, but after a moment she spoke to it.

"Fancy seeing you here, Minerva.”

She turned to smile at the tabby, but it had gone. Instead she was smiling at a rather severe-looking woman who was wearing square glasses exactly the shape of the markings the cat had had around its eyes. She, too, was wearing a cloak, an emerald one. Her black hair was drawn into a tight bun. She looked distinctly ruffled.

"How did you know it was me?" she asked.

"My dear Professor, I've never seen a cat sit so stiffly."

"You'd be stiff if you'd been sitting on a brick wall all day," said Professor Minerva McGonagall.

"All day? When you could have been celebrating? I must have passed a dozen feasts and parties on my way here."

Professor McGonagall sniffed angrily.

"Oh yes, everyone's celebrating, all right," she said impatiently.

"You'd think they'd be a bit more careful, but no—even the Muggles have noticed something's going on. It was on their news." She jerked her head back at the Dursleys' dark living-room window. "I heard it. Flocks of owls...shooting stars...Well, they're not completely stupid. They were bound to notice something. Shooting stars down in Kent—I'll bet that was Dedalus Diggle. He never had much sense."

"You can't blame them," said Dumbledore gently. "We've had precious little to celebrate for eleven years."

"I know that," said Professor McGonagall irritably. "But that's no reason to lose our heads. People are being downright careless, out on the streets in broad daylight, not even dressed in Muggle clothes, swapping rumors."

A sharp, sideways glance was thrown at Dumbledore here, as though hoping she would say something, but she didn't, so Professor McGonagall went on. "A fine thing it would be if, on the very day You-Know-Who seems to have disappeared at last, the Muggles found out about us all. I suppose he really has gone, Alba?"

"It certainly seems so," said Dumbledore. "We have much to be thankful for. Would you care for a cherry drop?"

"A what?"

"A cherry drop. They're a kind of Muggle sweet I'm rather fond of."

"No, thank you," said Professor McGonagall coldly, as though she didn't think this was the moment for cherry drops. "As I say, even if You-Know-Who has gone -"

"My dear Professor, surely a sensible person like yourself can call him by his name? All this 'You- Know-Who' nonsense—for eleven years I have been trying to persuade people to call him by his proper name: Voldemort." Professor McGonagall flinched, but Dumbledore, who was unsticking two cherry drops, seemed not to notice. "It all gets so confusing if we keep saying 'You-Know-Who.' I have never seen any reason to be frightened of saying Voldemort's name.

"I know you haven't, said Professor McGonagall, sounding half exasperated, half admiring. “But you're different. Everyone knows you're the only one You-Know—oh, all right, Voldemort, was frightened of."

"You flatter me," said Dumbledore calmly. "Voldemort had powers I will never have."

"Only because you're too—well—noble to use them."

"It's lucky it's dark. I haven't blushed so much since Professor Flitwick told me he liked my new earmuffs."

Professor McGonagall shot a sharp look at Dumbledore and said, "The owls are nothing next to the rumors that are flying around. You know what everyone's saying? About why he's disappeared? About what finally stopped him?"

It seemed that Professor McGonagall had reached the point she was most anxious to discuss, the real reason she had been waiting on a cold, hard wall all day, for neither as a cat nor as a woman had she fixed Dumbledore with such a piercing stare as she did now. It was plain that whatever "everyone" was saying, she was not going to believe it until Dumbledore told her it was true.

Dumbledore, however, was choosing another lemon drop and did not answer.

"What they're saying," she pressed on, "is that last night Voldemort turned up in Godric's Hollow. He went to find the Potters. The rumor is that Lily and James Potter are—are—that they're—dead."

Dumbledore bowed her head. Professor McGonagall gasped.

"Lily and James...I can't believe it...I didn't want to believe it...Oh, Alba..."

Dumbledore reached out and patted her on the shoulder. "I know...I know...," she said heavily.

Professor McGonagall's voice trembled as she went on. "That's not all. They're saying he tried to kill the Potter's children, Heather and Hadrian. But—he couldn't. He couldn't kill those little twins. No one knows why, or how, but they're saying that when he couldn't kill the Potter twins, Voldemort's power somehow broke—and that's why he's gone.

Dumbledore nodded glumly.

"It's—it's true?" faltered Professor McGonagall. "After all he's done...all the people he's killed...he couldn't kill two children? It's just astounding...of all the things to stop him...but how in the name of heaven did Heather and Hadrian survive?"

"We can only guess," said Dumbledore. "We may never know."

Professor McGonagall pulled out a lace handkerchief and dabbed at her eyes beneath her spectacles. Dumbledore gave a great sniff as she took a golden watch from her pocket and examined it. It was a very odd watch.

It had twelve hands but no numbers; instead, little planets were moving around the edge. It must have made sense to Dumbledore, though, because she put it back in his pocket and said, "Hagrid's late. I suppose it was he who told you I'd be here, by the way?"

"Yes," said Professor McGonagall. "And I don't suppose you're going to tell me why you're here, of all places?"

"I've come to bring Heather and Hadrian to their aunt and uncle. They’re the only family they have left now."

"You don't mean—you can't mean the people who live here?" cried Professor McGonagall, jumping to her feet and pointing at Number Four. "Alba—you can't. I've been watching them all day. You couldn't find two people who are less like us. And they've got this son—I saw him kicking his mother all the way up the street, screaming for sweets. The Potter twins come and live here!"

"It's the best place for them," said Dumbledore firmly. “Their aunt and uncle will be able to explain everything to them when they’re older. I've written a letter."

"A letter?" repeated Professor McGonagall faintly, sitting back down on the wall. "Really, Alba, you think you can explain all this in a letter? These people will never understand them! They'll be famous—a legend—I wouldn't be surprised if today was known as Heather or Hadrian Potter Day in the future—there will be books written about Heather and Hadrian—every child in our world will know their names!"

"Exactly," said Dumbledore, looking very seriously over the top of her half-moon glasses. "It would be enough to turn any child's head. Famous before they can walk and talk! Famous for something they won't even remember! Can’t you see how much better off they'll be, growing up away from all that until they’re ready to take it?"

Professor McGonagall opened her mouth, changed her mind, swallowed, and then said, "Yes—yes, you're right, of course. But how are the twins getting here, Alba?" She eyed the other woman’s cloak suddenly, as though the children might be hidden beneath it.

"Hagrid will be bringing them."

"You think it—wise—to trust Hagrid with something as important as this?"

“I would trust Hagrid with my life," said Dumbledore.

"I'm not saying his heart isn't in the right place," said Professor McGonagall grudgingly, "but you can't pretend he's not careless. He does tend to—what was that?"

A low rumbling sound had broken the silence around them. It grew steadily louder as they looked up and down the street for some sign of a headlight; it swelled to a roar as they both looked up at the sky – and a huge motorcycle fell out of the air and landed on the road in front of them.

If the motorcycle was huge, it was nothing to the man sitting astride it. He was almost twice as tall as a normal man and at least five times as wide. He looked simply too big to be allowed, and so wild – long tangles of bushy black hair and beard hid most of his face, his hands were the size of trash can lids, and his feet in their leather boots were like baby dolphins.

In his vast, muscular arms he held a bundle of blankets.

"Hagrid," said Dumbledore, sounding relieved. "At last. And where did you get that motorcycle?"

"Borrowed it, Professor Dumbledore, ma’am," said the giant, climbing carefully off the motorcycle as he spoke. "Young Sirius Black lent it to me. I've got them, ma’am."

"No problems, were there?"

"No, ma’am—house was almost destroyed, but I got them out all right before the Muggles started swarmin' around. Heather fell asleep as we was flyin' over Bristol."

Dumbledore and Professor McGonagall bent forward over the bundle of blankets. Inside, just visible, were a baby boy and a girl, the girl fast asleep. Under a tuft of jet-black hair over the girl's forehead they could see a curiously shaped cut, like a bolt of lightning. There was one on the boy's forehead as well, mirroring the girl's cut from under dark red hair.

"Is that where—?" whispered Professor McGonagall.

"Yes," said Dumbledore. "They'll have the scars forever."

"Couldn't you do something about it, Alba?"

"Even if I could, I wouldn't. Scars can come in handy. I have one myself above my left knee that is a perfect map of the London Underground. Well—give them here, Hagrid—we'd better get this over with."

Dumbledore took Heather and Hadrian in her arms and turned toward the Dursleys' house.

"Could I—could I say good-bye to them, ma'am?" asked Hagrid. He bent his great, shaggy head over Heather and Hadrian and gave each of them what must have been a very scratchy, whiskery kiss. Then, suddenly, Hagrid let out a howl like a wounded dog.

"Shhh!" hissed Professor McGonagall, "you'll wake the Muggles!"

"S-s-sorry," sobbed Hagrid, taking out a large, spotted handkerchief and burying his face in it. "But I c-c-can't stand it—Lily an' James dead—an'  th' poor little twins off ter live with Muggles -"

"Yes, yes, it's all very sad, but get a grip on yourself, Hagrid, or we'll be found," Professor McGonagall whispered, patting Hagrid gingerly on the arm as Dumbledore stepped over the low garden wall and walked to the front door. She laid the twins gently on the doorstep, took a letter out of her cloak, tucked it inside their blankets, and then came back to the other two.

For a full minute the three of them stood and looked at the little bundle; Hagrid's shoulders shook, Professor McGonagall blinked furiously, and the twinkling light that usually shone from Dumbledore's eyes seemed to have gone out.

"Well," said Dumbledore finally, "that's that. We've no more business here. We may as well go and join the celebrations."

"Yeah," said Hagrid in a muffled voice, "I'll be takin' Sirius his bike back. G'night, Professor McGonagall, Professor Dumbledore, ma’am."

Wiping his streaming eyes on his jacket sleeve, Hagrid swung himself onto the motorcycle and kicked the engine into life; with a roar it rose into the air and off into the night.

"I shall see you soon, I expect, Minerva," said Dumbledore, nodding to her. Professor McGonagall blew her nose in reply.

Dumbledore turned and walked back down the street. On the corner she stopped and took out the silver Put-Outer. She clicked it once, and twelve balls of light sped back to their street lamps so that Privet Drive glowed suddenly orange and he could make out a tabby cat slinking around the corner at the other end of the street. She could just see the bundle of blankets on the step of Number Four.

"Good luck, Heather, Hadrian," she murmured. She turned on her heel, and with a swish of her cloak, was gone.

A breeze ruffled the neat hedges of Privet Drive, which lay silent and tidy under the inky sky, the very last place you would expect astonishing things to happen. Hadrian Potter rolled over inside his blankets without waking up. Heather Potter's small hand closed on the letter beside them and her brother slept on, not knowing they were special, not knowing they were famous, and not knowing that they would be woken in a few hours' time by Petunia Dursley's scream as she opened the front door to put out the milk bottles, nor that they would spend the next few weeks being prodded and pinched by their cousin Dudley.

They couldn't know that at this very moment, people meeting in secret all over the country were holding up their glasses and saying in hushed voices: "To Heather and Hadrian Potter—the ones who lived!"


	2. Chapter II: The Snake and The Glass

Nearly ten years had passed since the Dursleys had woken up to find their niece and nephew on the front step, but Privet Drive had hardly changed at all.

The sun rose on the same tidy front gardens and lit up the brass number four on the Dursleys' front door; it crept into their living room, which was almost exactly the same as it had been on the night when Vernon Dursley had seen that fateful news report about the owls.

Only the photographs on the mantelpiece really showed how much time had passed.

Ten years ago, there had been lots of pictures of what looked like a large pink beach ball wearing different-colored bonnets—but Dudley Dursley was no longer a baby, and now the photographs showed a large blond boy riding his first bicycle, on a carousel at the fair, playing a computer game with his father, being hugged and kissed by his mother.

There was no sign at all that other children lived in the house. Yet Heather and Hadrian Potter were still there. Hadrian was asleep at the moment, but Heather was already awake, and she could hear her Aunt Petunia’s footsteps quickly making her way towards their living space.

“Hadrian, get up,” she hissed, nudging her brother’s shoulder. “Aunt Petunia’s coming!”

Hadrian stirred but did not awake.

"Up! Get up! Now!"

Hadrian woke with a start. Their aunt rapped on the door again.

"Up!" she screeched. Heather heard her walking toward the kitchen and then the sound of the frying pan being put on the stove. Hadrian rolled onto his back and tried to remember the dream he had been having.

“Heather, I was having a dream,” he said.

She looked at him oddly. “…Was there a flying motorcycle in it?” She asked.

He was surprised. “Yes. Did you have it too?”

She paused, and then nodded. Her head swiveled back towards the door which their aunt was rapping on again.

"Are you up yet?" she demanded.

"Yes, ma’am," said Heather.

"Well, get a move on, I want you to look after the bacon. And don't you dare let it burn."

Heather merely sighed and nodded.

“And you,” their aunt said. “Weed the garden, I want everything perfect on Duddy's birthday.”

Hadrian groaned.

"What did you say?" his aunt snapped through the door.

"Nothing, nothing..."

Heather looked at him sternly. “Don’t make this worse than it has to be,” she murmured softly.

Dudley's birthday—how could they have forgotten? Hadrian slowly got out of bed and started looking for socks. Heather passed him a pair sitting nearby, after pulling a spider out of one.

They were used to spiders, because the cupboard under the stairs was full of them, and that was where they slept.

When Hadrian was dressed he went down the hall and through the back door to the garden. Heather followed him, but instead of going to the garden, she went into the kitchen.

The table was almost hidden beneath all Dudley's birthday presents. It looked as though Dudley had gotten the new computer he wanted, not to mention the second television and the racing bike.

Exactly why Dudley wanted a racing bike was a mystery to Heather—she figured her brother might understand, as it could just be a guy thing.

But even so, Dudley was very fat and hated exercise—unless it involved punching somebody. Dudley's favorite punching bag were her and her brother, but he couldn't often catch them. Heather didn’t look it, but she was very small and nimble.

Her brother was too, though for him it was more of the fact that he was malnourished than natural stature—if he was given more to eat, she thought, he might be much taller.

Perhaps it had something to do with living in a dark cupboard, but both twins had always been small and skinny for their age. They looked even smaller and skinnier than they really were because all they had to wear were old clothes of Dudley's, and Dudley was about two times bigger than Hadrian, and twice so of Heather.

Heather and Hadrian had thin faces and knobbly knees. But while Hadrian had ginger hair and chocolate brown eyes, Heather had brilliant green eyes and a bird’s nest of black hair.

She also wore round glasses held together with a lot of Scotch tape because of all the times Dudley had punched her on the nose.

The only thing the twins liked about their appearances were a pair of very thin scars on their foreheads that were each shaped like a bolt of lightning.

They had had them for as long as they could remember, and the first question Heather remembered Hadrian asking Aunt Petunia was about how they’d gotten them.

"In the car crash when your parents died," she’d replied, not very kindly. "And don't ask questions."

Don't ask questions—that was the first rule for a quiet life with the Dursleys.

Uncle Vernon entered the kitchen as Heather was turning over the bacon.

"Comb your hair!" he barked, by way of a morning greeting.

Heather was frying eggs by the time Dudley arrived in the kitchen with his mother. Dudley looked a lot like Uncle Vernon.

He had a large pink face, not much neck, small, watery blue eyes, and thick blond hair that lay smoothly on his thick, fat head. Aunt Petunia often said that Dudley looked like a baby angel—Hadrian often said that Dudley looked like a pig in a wig.

Heather put the plates of egg and bacon on the table, which was difficult as there wasn't much room. Just as she did this, Hadrian quietly walked into the kitchen. Dudley, meanwhile, was counting his presents.

His face fell.

"Thirty-six," he said, looking up at his mother and father. "That's two less than last year."

"Darling, you haven't counted Auntie Marge's present, see, it's here under this big one from Mommy and Daddy."

"All right, thirty-seven then," said Dudley, going red in the face.

Hadrian began wolfing down his food, as he could sense one of Dudley’s infamous tantrums coming. Heather, on the other hand, quietly polished off her food, and nudged her brother irritated when he got specks of bacon on her.

Aunt Petunia obviously scented danger, too, because she said quickly, “And we'll buy you another two presents while we're out today. How's that, popkin? Two more presents. Is that all right?”

Dudley thought for a moment. It looked like hard work. Finally he said slowly, "So I'll have thirty ...thirty..."

"Thirty-nine, sweetums," said Aunt Petunia.

"Oh." Dudley sat down heavily and grabbed the nearest parcel. "All right then."

Uncle Vernon chuckled. "Little tyke wants his money's worth, just like his father. 'Atta boy, Dudley!" He ruffled Dudley's hair.

At that moment the telephone rang and Aunt Petunia went to answer it while Heather left to finish the weeding she guessed Hadrian had likely left undone.

Hadrian and Uncle Vernon watched Dudley unwrap the racing bike, a video camera, a remote control airplane, sixteen new computer games, and a VCR. He was ripping the paper off a gold wristwatch when Aunt Petunia came back from the telephone looking both angry and worried.

"Bad news, Vernon," she said. "Mrs. Figg's broken her leg. She can't take them." She jerked her head in Hadrian's direction.

Dudley's mouth fell open in horror, but Hadrian's heart gave a leap. Every year on Dudley's birthday, his parents took him and a friend out for the day, to adventure parks, hamburger restaurants, or the movies.

Every year, Hadrian and Heather were left behind with Mrs. Figg, a mad old lady who lived two streets away. Heather said that she wasn’t so bad in comparison to the Dursleys.

Hadrian hated it there. The whole house smelled of cabbage and Mrs. Figg made him look at photographs of all the cats she'd ever owned. Heather enjoyed playing with the cats, but even she agreed the woman was quite batty.

"Now what?" said Aunt Petunia, looking furiously at Hadrian as though he'd planned this. Hadrian knew he ought to feel sorry that Mrs. Figg had broken her leg, but it wasn't easy when he reminded himself it would be a whole year before he had to look at Tibbles, Snowy, Mr. Paws, and Tufty again.

"We could phone Marge," Uncle Vernon suggested.

"Don't be silly, Vernon, she hates them."

The Dursleys often spoke about the twins like this, as though they wasn't there—or rather, as though they were something very nasty that couldn't understand them, like slugs.

"What about what's-her-name, your friend—Yvonne?"

"On vacation in Majorca," snapped Aunt Petunia.

"You could just leave us here," Hadrian put in hopefully (he'd be able to watch what he wanted on television for a change and maybe even have a go on Dudley's computer, though he knew Heather would likely not let him for fear of getting in trouble).

Aunt Petunia looked as though she'd just swallowed a lemon.

"And come back and find the house in ruins?" she snarled.

"We won't blow up the house," said Hadrian, but they weren't listening.

"I suppose we could take them to the zoo," said Aunt Petunia slowly, "...and leave them in the car...."

"That car's new, they're not sitting in it alone...."

Dudley began to cry loudly. In fact, he wasn't really crying—it had been years since he'd really cried—but he knew that if he screwed up his face and wailed, his mother would give him anything he wanted.

"Dinky Duddydums, don't cry, Mummy won't let them spoil your special day!" she cried, flinging her arms around him.

"I...don't...want...them...t-t-to come!" Dudley yelled between huge, pretend sobs. "They always sp- spoil everything!" He shot Hadrian a nasty grin through the gap in his mother's arms.

Just then, the doorbell rang—"Oh, good Lord, they're here!" said Aunt Petunia frantically—and a moment later, Dudley's best friend, Piers Polkiss, walked in with his mother.

Piers was a scrawny boy with a face like a rat. He was usually the one who held people's arms behind their backs while Dudley hit them. Dudley stopped pretending to cry at once.

Half an hour later, Hadrian and Heather (who couldn't believe their luck) were sitting in the back of the Dursleys' car with Piers and Dudley, on the way to the zoo for the first time in their life.

His aunt and uncle hadn't been able to think of anything else to do with them, but before they'd left, Uncle Vernon had taken them aside.

"I'm warning you," he had said, putting his large purple face right up close to Hadrian's, "I'm warning you now—any funny business, anything at all—and you'll be in that cupboard from now until Christmas."

"I'm not going to—“

“We won’t do anything, Uncle Vernon,” Heather said, cutting him off. She often did this when it seemed he would say something impulsive and get them in trouble.

But Uncle Vernon didn't believe them. It was rare that anyone did.

The problem was, strange things often happened around the twins and it was just no good telling the Dursleys they weren’t the reason.

Once, Aunt Petunia had been trying to force Hadrian into a revolting old sweater of Dudley's (brown with orange puff balls)—the harder she tried to pull it over his head, the smaller it seemed to become, until finally it might have fitted a hand puppet, but certainly wouldn't fit Hadrian. Aunt Petunia had decided it must have shrunk in the wash and, to Heather’s great relief, Hadrian wasn't punished.

On the other hand, Heather gotten into terrible trouble for being found on the roof of the school kitchens (When Hadrian had heard about this one, he’d gotten a terrible laugh out of it). Dudley's gang had been chasing her as usual when, as much to Heather's surprise as anyone else's, there he was sitting on the chimney.

The Dursleys had received a very angry letter from Heather and Hadrian's headmistress telling them Heather had been climbing school buildings.

But all she'd tried to do (as Hadrian had shouted at Uncle Vernon through the locked door of her cupboard) was jump behind the big trash cans outside the kitchen doors.

Hadrian supposed that the wind must have caught her in mid-jump. Heather had asked him if he was okay when he’d said so to her, and he’d asked her if she had a better explanation. She did not.

But today, nothing would go wrong. It was even worth being with Dudley and Piers to be spending the day somewhere that wasn't school, their cupboard, or Mrs. Figg's cabbage-smelling living room (“It’s not that bad”).

While he drove, Uncle Vernon complained to Aunt Petunia. He liked to complain about things: people at work, the twins, the council, the twins, the bank, and the twins were just a few of his favorite subjects. This morning, it was motorcycles.

"...roaring along like maniacs, the young hoodlums," he said, as a motorcycle overtook them.

I had a dream about a motorcycle," said Hadrian, remembering suddenly. "It was flying."

“Hadrian!” Heather hissed. “Shush!”

Uncle Vernon nearly crashed into the car in front. He turned right around in his seat and yelled at Harry, his face like a gigantic beet with a mustache: "MOTORCYCLES DON'T FLY!"

Dudley and Piers sniggered.

“He knows they don't," said Heather. "It was only a dream."

But they both wished he hadn't said anything. If there was one thing the Dursleys hated even more than their asking questions, it was their talking about anything acting in a way it shouldn't, no matter if it was in a dream or even a cartoon—they seemed to think the twins might get dangerous ideas.

It was a very sunny Saturday and the zoo was crowded with families. The Dursleys bought Dudley and Piers large chocolate ice creams at the entrance and then, because the smiling lady in the van had asked the twins what they wanted before the Dursleys could hurry them away, they bought them a single cheap lemon ice pop to share between them.

It wasn't bad, either, Hadrian thought, licking the pop as they watched a gorilla scratching its head who looked remarkably like Dudley, except that it wasn't blond. Heather laughed softly when he whispered this to her.

They had the best morning they'd had in a long time. Heather was careful to stay a little way apart from the Dursleys so that Dudley and Piers, who were starting to get bored with the animals by lunchtime, wouldn't fall back on their favorite hobby of hitting the twins.

They ate in the zoo restaurant, and when Dudley had a tantrum because his Knickerbocker glory didn't have enough ice cream on top, Uncle Vernon bought him another one and Heather was allowed to finish the first.

She felt, afterward, that she should have known it was all too good to last.

After lunch they went to the reptile house. It was cool and dark in there, with lit windows all along the walls. Behind the glass, all sorts of lizards and snakes were crawling and slithering over bits of wood and stone.

Dudley and Piers wanted to see huge, poisonous cobras and thick, man-crushing pythons. Dudley quickly found the largest snake in the place. It could have wrapped its body twice around Uncle Vernon's car and crushed it into a trash can—but at the moment it didn't look in the mood. In fact, it was fast asleep.

Dudley stood with his nose pressed against the glass, staring at the glistening brown coils.

"Make it move," he whined at his father. Uncle Vernon tapped on the glass, but the snake didn't budge.

"Do it again," Dudley ordered. Uncle Vernon rapped the glass smartly with his knuckles, but the snake just snoozed on.

"This is boring," Dudley moaned. He shuffled away.

Heather moved in front of the tank and looked intently at the snake. Hadrian followed suit, though he didn’t seem as interested.

Heather wouldn't have been surprised if the snake had died of boredom itself—no company except rude people drumming their fingers on the glass trying to disturb it all day long.

It was worse than having a cupboard as a bedroom, where the only visitor was Aunt Petunia hammering on the door to wake you up; at least she and Hadrian got to visit the rest of the house.

The snake suddenly opened its beady eyes. Slowly, very slowly, it raised its head until its eyes were on a level with the twins'.

It winked.

Heather blinked in surprise. Hadrian tilted his head thoughtfully at the snake, then winked back.

The snake jerked its head toward Uncle Vernon and Dudley, then raised its eyes to the ceiling. It gave the twins a look that said quite plainly: "I get that all the time.”

"I know," Hadrian murmured through the glass, though he wasn't sure the snake could hear him.

"It must be really annoying," Heather added softly.

The snake nodded vigorously.

"Where do you come from, anyway?" Hadrian asked.

The snake jabbed its tail at a little sign next to the glass. Heather peered at it.

Boa Constrictor, Brazil.

"Was it nice there?" Hadrian asked.

Heather pointed to the sign this time and Hadrian read on: This specimen was bred in the zoo. "Oh, I see—so you've never been to Brazil?"

“Clearly not,” Heather said, looking long-sufferingly at her brother. The snake hissed an amused laugh at her.

As it did so, a deafening shout behind the twins made all of them jump.

"DUDLEY! MR. DURSLEY! COME AND LOOK AT THIS SNAKE! YOU WON'T BELIEVE WHAT IT'S DOING!"

Dudley came waddling toward them as fast as he could.

"Out of the way, you," he said, punching Hadrian in the ribs, though Heather managed to move out of the way before she became collateral damage.

Caught by surprise, Hadrian fell hard on the concrete floor. What came next happened so fast no one saw how it happened—one second, Piers and Dudley were leaning right up close to the glass, the next, they had leapt back with howls of horror.

Heather gasped; the glass front of the boa constrictor's tank had vanished. The great snake was uncoiling itself rapidly, slithering out onto the floor. People throughout the reptile house screamed and started running for the exits.

As the snake slid swiftly past the both of them, the twins could have sworn a low, hissing voice said, "Brazil, here I come....Thanksss, amigos."

The keeper of the reptile house was in shock.

"But the glass," he kept saying, "where did the glass go?"

The zoo director himself made Aunt Petunia a cup of strong, sweet tea while he apologized over and over again. Piers and Dudley could only gibber.

As far as Heather had seen, the snake hadn't done anything except snap playfully at their heels as it passed, but by the time they were all back in Uncle Vernon's car, Dudley was telling them how it had nearly bitten off his leg, while Piers was swearing it had tried to squeeze him to death.

Hadrian was looking more and more irritated by their outlandish tale by the minute, and Heather was feeling a strong sense of foreboding.

It happened to be right on the dot, as Piers calming down enough to say, "Hadrian was talking to it, weren't you, Hadrian?"

Uncle Vernon waited until Piers was safely out of the house before starting on the twins. He was so angry he could hardly speak. He managed to say, "Go—cupboard—stay—no meals," before he collapsed into a chair, and Aunt Petunia had to run and get him a large brandy.

They lay in their dark cupboard much later, Heather wishing they had a watch. They didn't know what time it was and they couldn't be sure the Dursleys were asleep yet. Until they were, she couldn't risk letting Hadrian sneak into to the kitchen for some food.

They'd lived with the Dursleys almost ten years, ten miserable years, as long as they could remember, ever since they'd been babies and their parents had died in that car crash.

They couldn't remember being in the car when their parents had died, oddly enough. Sometimes, when Hadrian strained his memory during long hours in thir cupboard, he came up with a strange vision: a blinding flash of green light and a burning pain on his forehead.

This, Heather and he both supposed, was the crash, though she couldn't imagine where all the green light came from.

They couldn't remember their parents at all. Their aunt and uncle never spoke about them, and of course they were forbidden to ask questions. There were no photographs of them in the house.

When they had been younger, Heather had dreamed and dreamed of some unknown relation coming to take them away, but it had never happened; the Dursleys were their only family.

Yet sometimes she thought (or maybe hoped) that strangers in the street seemed to know them. Very strange strangers they were, too. A tiny man in a violet top hat had bowed to Hadrian once while out shopping with Aunt Petunia and Dudley.

After asking Hadrian furiously if he knew the man, Aunt Petunia had rushed them out of the shop without buying anything. A wild-looking old woman dressed all in green had waved merrily at Heather once on a bus.

A bald man in a very long purple coat had actually shaken each of their hands in the street the other day and then walked away without a word. The weirdest thing about all these people was the way they seemed to vanish the second the twins tried to get a closer look.

At school, the twins had no one. Everybody knew that Dudley's gang hated that odd Hadrian Potter in his baggy old clothes and Heather Potter in her broken glasses, and nobody liked to disagree with Dudley's gang.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sporadic updates.


	3. Chapter III: The Letters From Hogwarts?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Canon divergence here.

The escape of the Brazilian boa constrictor earned the twins their longest-ever punishment.

By the time they were allowed out of their cupboard again, the summer holidays had started and Dudley had already broken his new video camera, crashed his remote control airplane, and, first time out on his racing bike, knocked down old Mrs. Figg as she crossed Privet Drive on her crutches.

Hadrian was glad school was over, but Heather wasn’t, as there was still no escaping Dudley's gang, who visited the house every single day.

Piers, Dennis, Malcolm, and Gordon were all big and stupid, but as Dudley was the biggest and stupidest of the lot, he was the leader. The rest of them were all quite happy to join in Dudley's favorite sport: Hadey Hunting.

This was why both twins spent as much time as possible out of the house, wandering around and thinking about the end of the holidays, where Heather could see a tiny ray of hope.

When September came they would be going off to secondary school and, for the first time in their life, he wouldn't be with Dudley. Dudley had been accepted at Uncle Vernon's old private school, Smeltings. Piers Polkiss was going there too.

The twins, on the other hand, were going to Stonewall High, the local public school. Dudley thought this was very funny.

"They stuff people's heads down the toilet the first day at Stonewall," he told Hadrian. "Want to come upstairs and practice?"

"No, thanks," said Hadrian. "The poor toilet's never had anything as horrible as your head down it—it might be sick." Then he ran, before Dudley could work out what he’d said.

One day in July, Aunt Petunia took Dudley to London to buy his Smeltings uniform, leaving Harry at Mrs. Figg's. Mrs. Figg wasn't as bad as usual. It turned out she'd broken her leg tripping over one of her cats, and she didn't seem quite as fond of them as before. She let the twins watch television and gave them a bit of chocolate cake that tasted as though she'd had it for several years. Heather scolded Hadrian later for being happy about her breaking her leg.

That evening, Dudley paraded around the living room for the family in his brand-new uniform. Smeltings' boys wore maroon tailcoats, orange knickerbockers, and flat straw hats called boaters.

They also carried knobbly sticks, used for hitting each other while the teachers weren't looking. This was supposed to be good training for later life.

As he looked at Dudley in his new knickerbockers, Uncle Vernon said gruffly that it was the proudest moment of his life. Aunt Petunia burst into tears and said she couldn't believe it was her Ickle Dudleykins, he looked so handsome and grown-up.

Neither twin trusted themselves to speak. Hadrian thought two of his ribs might already have cracked from trying not to laugh.

There was a horrible smell in the kitchen the next morning when the twins went in for breakfast. It seemed to be coming from a large metal tub in the sink. Hadrian went to have a look. The tub was full of what looked like dirty rags swimming in gray water.

"What's this?" he asked Aunt Petunia. Her lips tightened as they always did if the twins dared to ask a question.

"Your new school uniform," she said.

Hadrian looked in the bowl again.

"Oh," he said, "I didn't realize it had to be so wet."

Heather glared at him for his wit.

"Don’t be stupid," snapped Aunt Petunia. "I'm dying some of Dudley's old things gray for you two. It'll look just like everyone else's when I've finished."

Both he and Heather seriously doubted this, but thought it best not to argue.

Heather sat down at the table and tried not to think about how she was going to look on her first day at Stonewall High—like she was wearing bits of old elephant skin, probably.

Dudley and Uncle Vernon came in, both with wrinkled noses because of the smell from the twins’ new uniforms. Uncle Vernon opened his newspaper as usual and Dudley banged his Smelting stick, which he carried everywhere, on the table.

They heard the click of the mail slot and flop of letters on the doormat.

"Get the mail, Dudley," said Uncle Vernon from behind his paper.

"Make Hadrian get it."

"Get the mail, Hadrian."

"Make Dudley get it."

Heather glared at him again.

"Poke him with your Smelting stick, Dudley."

Hadrian dodged the Smelting stick and went to get the mail. Three things lay on the doormat: a postcard from Uncle Vernon's sister Marge, who was vacationing on the Isle of Wight, a brown envelope that looked like a bill, and—letters for Hadrian and Heather.

Hadrian picked his up and stared at it, his heart twanging like a giant elastic band.

No one, ever, in their whole lives, had written to the twins. Who would? They had no friends, no other relatives—they didn't belong to the library, so they'd never even gotten rude notes asking for books back. Yet here it was, a letter, addressed so plainly there could be no mistake:

Mr. H. Potter

The Cupboard under the Stairs

4 Privet Drive

Little Whinging

Surrey

The envelope was thick and heavy, made of yellowish parchment, and the address was written in emerald-green ink. There was no stamp.

Turning the envelope over, his hand trembling, Hadrian saw a purple wax seal bearing a coat of arms; a lion, an eagle, a badger, and a snake surrounding a large letter H.

"Hurry up, boy!" shouted Uncle Vernon from the kitchen. "What are you doing, checking for letter bombs?" He chuckled at his own joke.

Hadrian went back to the kitchen, still staring at the twins’ letters. He handed Uncle Vernon the bill and the postcard and sat down.

Uncle Vernon ripped open the bill, snorted in disgust, and flipped over the postcard.

Hadrian quickly motioned to Heather and passed her letter to her. Heather stared at the letter, wide-eyed. Then she quickly grabbed it and stuffed it in her shirt, motioning for him to do the same. Hadrian shook his head and began to open his envelope.

"Marge's ill," he informed Aunt Petunia. "Ate a funny whelk—"

"Dad!" said Dudley suddenly. "Dad, Hadrian's got something!"

Hadrian was on the point of unfolding his letter, which was written on the same heavy parchment as the envelope, when it was jerked sharply out of his hand by Uncle Vernon.

"That's mine!" said Hadrian, trying to snatch it back.

"Who'd be writing to you?" sneered Uncle Vernon, shaking the letter open with one hand and glancing at it. His face went from red to green faster than a set of traffic lights. And it didn't stop there. Within seconds it was the grayish white of old porridge.

"P-P-Petunia!" he gasped.

Dudley tried to grab the letter to read it, but Uncle Vernon held it high out of his reach. Aunt Petunia took it curiously and read the first line. For a moment it looked as though she might faint. She clutched her throat and made a choking noise.

"Vernon! Oh my goodness—Vernon!"

They stared at each other, seeming to have forgotten that Hadrian and Dudley were still in the room. Dudley wasn't used to being ignored. He gave his father a sharp tap on the head with his Smelting stick.

"I want to read that letter," he said loudly.

“I want to read it," said Harry furiously, "as it's mine."

Heather caught his eye as he said this, and slowly shook her head, motioning towards her own letter. _We can look at mine,_ she mouthed.

"Get out, both of you," croaked Uncle Vernon, stuffing the letter back inside its envelope.

Heather grabbed Hadrian and dragged him to their cupboard.

"Let me see it!" Dudley could be heard demanding as they left.

"OUT!" Uncle Vernon could be heard roaring, and then a thud and the loud slamming of a door.

Heather closed the door of the cupboard, making sure nobody could see inside. She then took out her letter and began to open it slowly. Hadrian was bouncing in anticipation.

She pulled out the letter and read:

HOGWARTS SCHOOL of WITCHCRAFT and WIZARDRY

Headmaster: ALBUS DUMBLEDORE

(Order of Merlin, First Class, Grand Sorc., Chf. Warlock, Supreme Mugwump, International Confed. of Wizards)

Dear Ms. Potter,

We are pleased to inform you that you have been accepted at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Please find enclosed a list of all necessary books and equipment.

Term begins on September 1. We await your owl by no later than July 31.

Yours sincerely,

Minerva McGonagall,

Deputy Headmistress

She stared at it, then turned her head to meet her brother’s eyes. Finally, after a pause, Hadrian asked, “What do they mean, they await our owl?”

“I don’t know,” she replied. “I think it might just be a prank, or something.” She was sorely disappointed that their first letter had turned out to be nothing more than a cruel joke.

“No,” Hadrian said slowly. “It can’t have been, else Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia wouldn’t have acted the way they did.”

Heather agreed, but told him he should wait and see if there were more letters. If there were, then they would try to respond to whoever was sending them.

That evening when he got back from work, Uncle Vernon did something he'd never done before; he visited the twins in their cupboard.

"Where's my letter?" said Hadrian the moment Uncle Vernon had squeezed through the door, despite Heather’s warning glare at him. "Who's writing to me?"

"No one. It was addressed to you by mistake," said Uncle Vernon shortly. "I have burned it."

"It was not a mistake," began Hadrian angrily, "it had our cupboard on it."

"SILENCE!" yelled Uncle Vernon, and a couple of spiders fell from the ceiling. He took a few deep breaths and then forced his face into a smile, which looked quite painful.

"Er—yes, Hadrian—about this cupboard. Your aunt and I have been thinking...you two're really getting a bit big for it...we think it might be nice if you both moved into Dudley's second bedroom.

"Why?" asked Hadrian and Heather both.

"Don't ask questions!" snapped their uncle. "Take this stuff upstairs, now."

The Dursleys' house had four bedrooms: one for Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia, one for visitors (usually Uncle Vernon's sister, Marge), one where Dudley slept, and one where Dudley kept all the toys and things that wouldn't fit into his first bedroom.

It only took the twins one trip upstairs to move everything they owned from the cupboard to this room. Heather sat down on the bed and stared around them. Nearly everything in here was broken.

The month-old video camera was lying on top of a small, working tank Dudley had once driven over the next door neighbor's dog; in the corner was Dudley's first-ever television set, which he'd put his foot through when his favorite program had been canceled; there was a large birdcage, which had once held a parrot that Dudley had swapped at school for a real air rifle, which was up on a shelf with the end all bent because Dudley had sat on it.

Other shelves were full of books. They were the only things in the room that looked as though they'd never been touched. Heather vowed to read some of them as soon as possible; Hadrian looked at them like they were the plague.

From downstairs came the sound of Dudley bawling at his mother, I don't want them in there...I need that room...make them get out...."

Heather sighed and stretched out on the bed. She was really very curious as to what the letter had been talking about, and she wondered if it really was serious. After all, it couldn’t have been for no reason that Uncle Vernon had suddenly decided that they should be moved to the bedroom.

Next morning at breakfast, everyone was rather quiet. Dudley was in shock. He'd screamed, whacked his father with his Smelting stick, been sick on purpose, kicked his mother, and thrown his tortoise through the greenhouse roof, and he still didn't have his room back.

Hadrian was thinking about this time yesterday and eagerly waiting for another letter. Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia kept looking at each other darkly.

When the mail arrived, Uncle Vernon, who seemed to be trying to be nice to the twins, made Dudley go and get it. They could hear him banging things with his Smelting stick all the way down the hall.

Then he shouted, "There's another one! 'Mr. H. Potter, The Smallest Bedroom, 4 Privet Drive—'"

With a strangled cry, Uncle Vernon leapt from his seat and ran down the hall, Hadrian right behind him. Uncle Vernon had to wrestle Dudley to the ground to get the letters from him, which was made difficult by the fact that Hadrian had grabbed Uncle Vernon around the neck from behind.

After a minute of confused fighting, in which everyone got hit a lot by the Smelting stick, Uncle Vernon straightened up, gasping for breath, with Hadrian and Heather's letters clutched in his hand.

"Go to your cupboard—I mean, your bedroom," he wheezed at Hadrian. "Dudley—go—just go."

A little later, Heather walked round and round the twins’ new room. The fact that they’d gotten another letter didn’t exactly mean that the writer was serious; it could still just be a prank. But Hadrian had taken it as proof that the letters were real, and he had a plan to get his.

The repaired alarm clock rang at six o'clock the next morning. Hadrian turned it off quickly and dressed silently, making sure Heather and the Dursleys were still asleep. He stole downstairs without turning on any of the lights.

He was going to wait for the postman on the corner of Privet Drive and get the letters for number four first. His heart hammered as he crept across the dark hall toward the front door—Hadrian leapt into the air; he'd trodden on something big and squashy on the doormat—something alive!

Lights clicked on upstairs and to his horror Hadrian realized that the big, squashy something had been his uncle's face. Uncle Vernon had been lying at the foot of the front door in a sleeping bag, clearly making sure that Hadrian didn't do exactly what he'd been trying to do.

He shouted at Hadrian for about half an hour and then told him to go and make a cup of tea. Hadrian shuffled miserably off into the kitchen where Heather was waiting for him, hands on her hips, ready to reprimand him. By the time he got back, the mail had arrived, right into Uncle Vernon's lap.

Harry could see six letters addressed in green ink.

I want—" he began, but Uncle Vernon was tearing the letters into pieces before his eyes. Uncle Vernon didn’t go to work that day. He stayed at home and nailed up the mail slot.

"See," he explained to Aunt Petunia through a mouthful of nails, "if they can't deliver them they'll just give up."

"I'm not sure that'll work, Vernon."

"Oh, these people's minds work in strange ways, Petunia, they're not like you and me," said Uncle Vernon, trying to knock in a nail with the piece of fruitcake Aunt Petunia had just brought him.

On Friday, no less than twenty-four letters arrived for Hadrian and Heather. As they couldn't go through the mail slot they had been pushed under the door, slotted through the sides, and a few even forced through the small window in the downstairs bathroom.

Uncle Vernon stayed at home again. After burning all the letters, he got out a hammer and nails and boarded up the cracks around the front and back doors so no one could go out. He hummed "Tiptoe Through the Tulips" as he worked, and jumped at small noises.

On Saturday, things began to get out of hand. Forty-eight letters to Harry found their way into the house, two each rolled up and hidden inside each of the two dozen eggs that their very confused milkman had handed Aunt Petunia through the living room window.

While Uncle Vernon made furious telephone calls to the post office and the dairy trying to find someone to complain to, Aunt Petunia shredded the letters in her food processor.

"Who on earth wants to talk to you this badly?" Dudley asked the twins in amazement.

On Sunday morning, Uncle Vernon sat down at the breakfast table looking tired and rather ill, but happy.

"No post on Sundays," he reminded them cheerfully as he spread marmalade on his newspapers, "no damn letters today—"

Something came whizzing down the kitchen chimney as he spoke and caught him sharply on the back of the head. Next moment, sixty or eighty letters came pelting out of the fireplace like bullets.

The Dursleys ducked, but Hadrian leapt into the air trying to catch one. Heather quickly crouched on the ground and grabbed two, one marked Mr. H. Potter, the other a replica of the first letter she’d gotten.

"Out! OUT!"

Uncle Vernon seized Hadrian around the waist and threw him into the hall.

When Aunt Petunia and Dudley had run out with their arms over their faces, Uncle Vernon slammed the door shut. They could hear the letters still streaming into the room, bouncing off the walls and floor.

"That does it," said Uncle Vernon, trying to speak calmly but pulling great tufts out of his mustache at the same time. I want you all back here in five minutes ready to leave. We're going away. Just pack some clothes. No arguments!"

He looked so dangerous with half his mustache missing that no one dared argue. Ten minutes later they had wrenched their way through the boarded-up doors and were in the car, speeding toward the highway.

Dudley was sniffling in the back seat; his father had hit him round the head for holding them up while he tried to pack his television, VCR, and computer in his sports bag.

They drove. And they drove. Even Aunt Petunia didn't dare ask where they were going. Every now and then Uncle Vernon would take a sharp turn and drive in the opposite direction for a while. "Shake'em off...shake 'em off," he would mutter whenever he did this.

They didn't stop to eat or drink all day. By nightfall Dudley was howling. He'd never had such a bad day in his life. He was hungry, he'd missed five television programs he'd wanted to see, and he'd never gone so long without blowing up an alien on his computer.

Uncle Vernon stopped at last outside a gloomy-looking hotel on the outskirts of a big city. Dudley and Hadrian shared a room with twin beds and damp, musty sheets. Dudley snored but Hadrian stayed awake.

He quietly stole out of the room, and found his sister already there. She motioned for him to follow her, and once they were outside of the hotel, passed his letter to him.

He looked at it and read:

HOGWARTS SCHOOL of WITCHCRAFT and WIZARDRY

Headmaster: ALBUS DUMBLEDORE

(Order of Merlin, First Class, Grand Sorc., Chf. Warlock, Supreme Mugwump, International Confed. of Wizards)

Dear Mr. Potter,

We are pleased to inform you that you have been accepted at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Please find enclosed a list of all necessary books and equipment.

Term begins on September 1. We await your owl by no later than July 31.

Yours sincerely,

Minerva McGonagall,

Deputy Headmistress

They met each other’s eyes and grinned; at this point, even Heather couldn’t deny that there had to be some shred of truth to the letters. But Uncle Vernon was going crazy, they both knew, and they had to hurry up and reply before he completely lost it.

“We still don’t know how to get an owl,” Hadrian pointed out.

Heather looked lost at how to reply to this, and decided to do something completely spontaneous: she walked over to the street and began to look around.

“What are you doing?” Hadrian asked.

“Those weird people in cloaks we see sometimes, I’m looking for one of them. If we’re going to this magic school, then they’re probably the magic people,” she replied.

Hadrian nodded, and then quickly turned around when he noticed someone in a cloak. He grabbed their cloak before they could disappear and asked the first thing that came to mind: “Do you have an owl?”

“Don’t be rude,” Heather admonished, but then she turned to the stranger and added. “We’d be really grateful if you could lend it to us.”

The stranger looked at them first in surprise, then with slight disgust, and then their expression changed to…awe?

“My dear…it can’t be…the scars…the Ones-Who-Lived? Oh Merlin, I never thought I’d meet them…”

The twins looked at each in confusion. “The what?” Hadrian said. “You seem to know us,” she said. “May we please borrow your owl?”

The stranger quickly nodded their head. “Of course, anything for the Ones-Who-Lived,” and motioned to a silent tawny owl sitting on their shoulder. The owl hooted quietly, and flew to Heather’s shoulder.

“Her name’s Morgan, it is,” the stranger said and continued to stare at them with quiet reverence.

Beginning to feel vaguely uncomfortable, Heather asked her brother for a pen, which he passed over to her, then began to write:

Dear Deputy Headmistress McGonagall,

We’d love to attend Hogwarts, but we don’t have any money, nor any means to get there. We also don’t know where exactly our hotel is, and we don’t think our aunt and uncle will help us. Is there any way somebody could be sent to guide us to the school? Or, at the very least, help us buy our supplies?

Sincerely,

Heather and Hadrian Potter

She passed the letter to the stranger, who tied it to their owl, and then both twins watched the owl fly off.

“Thank you,” she said awkwardly to the stranger. Then Hadrian tugged at her arm, and they walked back to their room in silence. Dudley was still sleeping like a log, and they climbed into their shared bed, wondering what tomorrow would bring.

The next day, they ate stale cornflakes and cold tinned tomatoes on toast for breakfast. They had just finished when a loud crack was heard and smoke filled their room.

A severe-looking woman with square glasses wearing an emerald cloak had appeared in the room.

Hadrian and Heather both quickly stood up, Hadrian pushing away his unappetizing breakfast. “Are you Ms. McGonagall?” He asked excitedly.

“I am—“

She made to answer but was quickly interrupted by Uncle Vernon.

“Who are you and what are you doing in our room?” He growled, slowly turning purple. Aunt Petunia looked somewhat afraid, and didn’t seem like she wanted to be involved any longer, as she pulled Dudley towards her.

Ms. McGonagall stared harshly at him, and then answered, “As I was saying, before I was so rudely interrupted, I am Professor McGonagall, Deputy Headmistress and Transfiguration Professor of Hogwarts.”

Hadrian grinned at Heather—it seemed that they wouldn’t be going to Stonewall, after all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Characters will be added to the tags as they appear.

**Author's Note:**

> Sporadic updates maybe?


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